What if?

I ran into town for a quick scavenger session for machine parts for my friend Briar and ran across an article about unfinished films. People were voicing their opinions on what unfinished film they wish had actually happened. I have been thinking about that all night as I watched Briar fiddle with fixing the engine of the battering ram we call Big Bam. I thought I would share with you fine people at the castle a few of the films I wish had been finished.

The first one that came to my mind was Creature From the Black Lagoon. In 1992 John Carpenter was behind a remake of the classic Universal monster movie. I would have loved to see Carpenter’s take on the material and often think about what might have been. Carpenter ended up making Memoirs of an Invisible Man in 1992 with Chevy Chase. While Memoirs is a decent movie, I have a feeling that the Creature film would have been much better. It appears that a remake is happening in 2014 simply called Black Lagoon but I will always wonder about what might have been.

The next film would be King Conan by John Milius. Conan the Barbarian is a movie that somehow captured the unique feel of a Robert E. Howard story and Conan’s world. It does not follow Howard’s stories faithfully but the film oozes the attitude. I feel this is thanks to Milius. At the end of Conan the Barbarian we see Conan sitting on a throne and are teased with a continuation of the story. We never got to the next chapter. Instead, we have the lackluster Conan the Destroyer, the decent Red Sonja and a modern remake that should have been better. Now that Arnold Schwarzenegger is back into acting, I have heard we may actually see a King Conan movie. Here’s hoping that they use the Milius script and that Arnold can still pull it off. I have no doubt he and Milius would have made it work back when.

The last would be The Hobbit by Guillermo del Toro. By now I’m certain that we have all seen The Hobbit by Peter Jackson and I must say that it was grand. I think Jackson holds such a firm grasp on Tolkien’s work that we had little doubt he would knock it out of the park as he did Lord of the Rings. Still, I would love to imagine what del Toro would have done with the material. At least we got Pacific Rim out of it.